> This pushes miners to the cheapest forms of electricity, i.e renewables
I would love for this to be true (and that's why I used to believe it). But there are two problems with this:
• Renewables aren't the cheapest form of electricity; low-value (dirty-burning) or subsidised fossil fuels are cheaper in many places. You've heard of people buying and re-commissioning old coal power stations for crypto mining, I'm sure?
• Using any grid electricity drives up the price of other electricity, by market forces. The effect is local, but when cryptomining is happening globally, that's a global effect. That means that otherwise-infeasible inefficient (and polluting) electricity generation is now viable.
Greenest ≠ cheapest. If this were a universal truth, we wouldn't have a climate problem in the first place.
I would love for this to be true (and that's why I used to believe it). But there are two problems with this:
• Renewables aren't the cheapest form of electricity; low-value (dirty-burning) or subsidised fossil fuels are cheaper in many places. You've heard of people buying and re-commissioning old coal power stations for crypto mining, I'm sure?
• Using any grid electricity drives up the price of other electricity, by market forces. The effect is local, but when cryptomining is happening globally, that's a global effect. That means that otherwise-infeasible inefficient (and polluting) electricity generation is now viable.
Greenest ≠ cheapest. If this were a universal truth, we wouldn't have a climate problem in the first place.